


Not the Best First Impression

by Persiflage



Series: Mashed Up Tropes Fics [3]
Category: Holby City
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Bernie Wolfe: World's Okay-est Lesbian, F/F, Mash-up, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Serena Campbell: Bisexual Extraordinaire, Trope de Trope, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:06:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27003214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persiflage/pseuds/Persiflage
Summary: After an awful first meeting can Bernie Fake Date her way to happiness with Serena Campbell?
Relationships: Serena Campbell/Bernie Wolfe
Series: Mashed Up Tropes Fics [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1960414
Comments: 12
Kudos: 58





	Not the Best First Impression

**Author's Note:**

> Written for an Anon for the Mashed Up Tropes Meme on Tumblr, for the tropes: 56. Awful First Meeting and 48. Fake Dating.
> 
> (This is another one that I'm looking at now and thinking I should've made it longer. Ah well.)

If there’s one thing Major Berenice Wolfe does not want to do, it’s attend the wedding of her ex-husband, Marcus Dunn. Unfortunately, both her children, Cameron and Charlotte, have begged her to be there for moral support as neither of them like Amelia Thorne, their new stepmother to be. Charlotte had carefully told her that it was okay for her to bring a plus one – Marcus had, somewhat reluctantly, agreed to this concession. 

The problem is that Bernie doesn’t have anyone to bring. Her relationship, such that it was, with Alex Dawson, anaesthetist and fellow member of the RAMC, had fizzled out within weeks of her getting divorced, and since she’s returned to civilian life, she hasn’t bothered to start dating, being rather too occupied with finding her feet after twenty fives years of active service in war zones. Of course, she hasn’t admitted this fact to her children as she doesn’t want them to either think she’s lame or have them set her up with someone.

In the meantime, Bernie is sent to work at Holby City General Hospital by the agency by which she’s employed as a locum. It’s a little weird, being back in the city where she was based when her children were small, but she doesn’t really mind where she’s working so long as she is working. Holby, she’s told, wants an experienced trauma surgeon to help them cost and bid for a trauma unit, and to train staff to use it once it’s been built, so she’s going to be there for quite a long spell. She finds herself a flat that’s relatively close to the hospital and isn’t too grotty, then fills her sports car (which isn’t a mid-life crisis purchase, despite her children’s jokes to that effect) with her belongings (one duffel bag, one medium sized suitcase, and two boxes) and heads across country from London (which has been her base since her divorce).

On her first morning, Bernie parks her car, then checks the time on her phone. Deciding she has at least ten minutes in hand, she pulls out a packet of cigarettes and lights up. Once she’s smoked her cigarette she pops a breath mint into her mouth, then heads into the hospital. She spots a coffeeshop called _Pulses_ and decides to grab herself a coffee before she heads to AAU where she’s supposed to be meeting the hospital’s CEO and the ward’s clinical lead for a preliminary discussion on their bid for a trauma unit.

Coffee in hand, Bernie swings around, aware that she’s in danger of being late if she doesn’t get a wriggle on as the queue took longer than she’d anticipated, and her packed satchel swings with rather more force than she’d imagined, smacking a cup of coffee out of the hand that’s holding it, spilling it all down the front of a bright red wool coat.

“Why don’t you look where you’re going?” snaps the brunette wearing the now coffee-stained coat.

“Shit!” Bernie curses, forgetting that she’s not in the field with a whole bunch of foulmouthed squaddies now.

“Language!” snaps the woman.

“I’m really sorry,” Bernie says, cringing. “I’ll pay for your coat to be cleaned.”

“Damn right you will.” The woman marches off before Bernie can say any more or apologise more thoroughly. 

She does apologise to the young lady with a _Pulses_ apron who comes to mop up, getting a shake of the head and a smile in response. Bernie sighs, then heads over to the sign board to find out where AAU is located.

She is more than a little mortified when she makes her way to the consultants’ office on AAU, after being directed by a cheery Cockney standing beside the nurses’ station, to discover that the woman she spilled coffee over is none other than Serena Campbell, deputy CEO of Holby City and clinical lead of AAU, in other words the woman she’s going to be working with for the next several months – assuming Ms Campbell doesn’t immediately throw her out on her ear, of course.

Fortunately, Henrik Hanssen, the hospital’s CEO, is also in the office, looming in silence over Ms Campbell as she recounts her run in with Bernie, whom she hasn’t yet noticed lurking in her doorway.

“Bloody woman was a total hooligan,” Bernie hears. “Nearly floored me with her satchel – and why does a grown woman have a satchel not a handbag? Only schoolchildren use them – and probably not even them, these days – it’s all nylon backpacks. And now the new consultant’s late and I haven’t had my coffee since it ended up over my coat and the floor. Can this day get any worse?”

“Um –” says Bernie from the doorway, thinking it’s about time to make her presence known. Or possibly past time. 

Hanssen turns, thereby giving Ms Campbell a clear view of the doorway, and the lanky blonde hooligan with the long pink coat and a bulky leather satchel over one shoulder, clutching a _Pulses_ coffee cup.

“Coffee?” Bernie says, holding out her still full cup. “It’s nothing fancy – just strong and hot, like I prefer, but I figure it might make up for me being a hooligan and spilling your last cup.”

To Bernie’s relief, Ms Campbell accepts the cup of coffee with an actual smile that lightens her whole face, then invites Bernie to sit at the desk across from her own, and the meeting begins with more cordiality than she’d expected.

Three weeks later Bernie’s going over the final costings for the trauma bay bid with Serena when her phone pings twice in rapid succession. Bernie apologises and checks it, unable to suppress a groan when she sees two texts, one from each of her children, wanting to know about her plus one for Marcus’ wedding the weekend after next.

“Sorry,” she says to Serena. 

“It’s fine. Anything urgent?”

“No, well not really, no. It’s just – never mind.”

Serena snorts. “You’ll have to tell me now or I’ll be eaten up with curiosity for the rest of the afternoon and unable to concentrate.”

This response makes Bernie snort in turn, then she explains about her ex-husband’s upcoming wedding, her reluctant agreement to attend, and how her grown-up children are now texting to demand who her plus one is.

“Trouble is, I don’t have a plus one. I haven’t had time to date, let alone establish anything vaguely approaching a meaningful relationship with another woman since I was discharged from the RAMC.”

“So take a friend,” Serena suggests.

Bernie can’t help snorting a second time. “I don’t have any friends.” She leans her elbows on her desk, pressing her hands to her face. “I am so pathetic.”

“Well, that’s not entirely true,” Serena says, and the unusual note of hesitation in her voice makes Bernie look up. “You do have one friend, albeit a very new one. That is – if you think you could bear to spend the duration with me?”

“Are you serious?” Bernie asks incredulously.

“As a heart attack.”

“Ouch,” Bernie says with a chuckle. 

Serena chuckles too, then raises an eyebrow. “What do you say, Major? Think you could stand it?”

“I think I could stand just about anything in your company, Campbell.”

Serena’s eyes widen and the unnamed something that’s been sizzling between them since that awful first meeting seems to make the air crackle.

“Then you’ve got a fake date, soldier.” Serena smirks. “Play your cards right, and you might even get lucky.”

Afterwards, Bernie thinks it’s just as well that Fletch knocked on the door at the next moment or she might well have forgotten just where she was and pounced on the brunette to kiss her completely senseless.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](https://pers-books.tumblr.com/post/629425059503718400/i-think-someone-already-asked-for-56-awful-first)


End file.
